Thursday 15th September 2016
Lunchtime "Glasgows Underground Railways" :
good little talk . Would like to see something added and practical next year like having a walk along the City & Union line or run a passenger train.
wee niggle; Screen too small for bright building

Evening City of Glasgow College Riverside Campus.
Very good. Impressive building and facilities. You could hear the enthusiasm from the presenters. Maybe add in something about the environmental design function of the building.

Saturday 17th September
RSNO

I think almost everything in this picture potentially moves to alter the acoustic properties. Very Impressive.
NB the wall on the bottom left in the up position while right hand side is down to narrow the space.

West of Scotland Cricket Club

Even got to see the indoor cages in an old air raid type shelter. It has been rented out for the day hence the bouncy castle.

Anderston Kelvingrove Church
The find of this year. Wonderful people , a true community facility with a diverse range of uses helping in all sorts of ways. Groups, churches(plural), night shelter etc etc
Also, what a building.

It is kind of criminal that places like this can struggle when there are places nearby and throughout the city that manage to have money poured in to them.

St Vincent Street.
Waiting for bus it struck me that this time next year this view will be very different. Archiving.

Hoskins Architects
Very much an activity stop . I took the opportunity to grab a picture out the corner windows :)

On way to Sheriffs Court

Sheriffs Court
Busy.

Savings Bank , Bridge Street
It was pretty dark in there . Informative talk. Maybe do outside bit first so all that dark eye adaption isnt thrown away a few minutes in.

Old Toll Bar
1-3 Paisley Road West Glasgow, G51 1LF
3rd September 2016
Previous Photos
With the great news that this bar is going to be reopening after almost three years of closure i stopped by to quickly see if i could get a quick look inside.
Happily the bar is still sound and ,at the very least, in need of a deep clean. The mirrors are intact and this will be a great if slightly out of the way bar.
This along with Portland Arms and Star Bar ( esp the front gushet bit ) are among the best looking bars but sadly unknown to most of the general population.

Bar is to the left as is the bottom of the stairs entrance. Nice little area at far end with a few tables just past the toilets.
Still in the process of booting up. Beers are on and very good. Needs some personal touches to liven up the space.

I am not sure what to make of this place.
Nicely fitted out with the branding all over place. Those floor signs are going to be tough to remove in the next rebrand. Doesnt make especially good use of such a nice big space. My usual complaints that the tables and layout feel like they have been done by someone who never goes to bars or restaurants. At least there are no couches. The long tables at the entrance and near the bar restrict movement and narrow access. The high chairs being at head height to people sitting down is always a strange decision. "Hey, here's an arse in your face" . I guess the curtain means this raised area can be separated which would make an even stranger place to go to. "Hey, is that a stage behind that"
If they were trying to be a North American brewpub it would have wait staff and table service but you need to get to the bar, away over there, past all the tables and chairs for everything. They might operate differently at night/weekends. Companies like SoCal's BJ's have been doing this concept for 40 years, the way this is always done here feels like someone went on vacation, visited a brewpub and copied without understanding.
I had one of their beers which was fine and tasted like all in house beers do, pizza was fine as well.
I wonder what made the local bloggers/twitterers so excited about its opening last week :)

On the day after the Vale announced they were going to be taking a 4 year vacation starting May 1st i thought i should make one of these increasingly rare photos for this blog. The break is apparently due to the Queen St redevelopment work, that after the current tunnel work, will impact Dundas street and the businesses there.
I wonder what will happen to Dows.